


That Sweet, Sweet Self-Loathing

by WordObsessed



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:20:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28482279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WordObsessed/pseuds/WordObsessed
Summary: Patton and Virgil bake and decorate some cookies, with mixed results
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	That Sweet, Sweet Self-Loathing

**Author's Note:**

> A fic for a gift exchange on the prompt "Moxiety baking holiday cookies"

"Virge!" Patton dropped the spoon he was holding into a bowl and leapt across the room to hug Virgil, who had just stepped into the door.

"Hey, Pat." Virgil hugged his best friend back, and if he got flour on his all-black ensemble, so what?

"I'm so glad you're here!" Patton stepped back and grinned.

"Tch, who else could you ask to get you out of situations where you're in over your head again?"

"It wasn't totally my fault this time, it just kinda snowballed. I didn't know what else to dough." He stepped back around the counter and held up his bowl of cookie dough that he was folding chocolate chip cookies into.

Virgil shook his head and took off his coat. "I'm happy to help. How many cookies do you have to do in total?"

"Um, one hundred?"

"Patton Leon Morales."

"It was supposed to be split amongst four people, two dozen-ish each. The others dropped out, and what am I supposed to tell my pastor? That she suddenly doesn't have any cookies for the carolers tomorrow night?"

"Ask some of the youth group kids to bake some! Stop at the store and buy some."

Patton scrunched up his nose. "Is it weird that I didn't even think of that?"

Virgil raised an eyebrow.

"But I'm committed to this now, and with your help, it won't even take that long!"

"Alrighty, if you say so."

"There will be fifty sugar cookies, two dozen chocolate chip, and two dozen oatmeal raisin. The sugar cookies are all cooling, and I need your expert artist skills to decorate them while I bake the chocolate and raisin ones."

"It's a deal."

"The piping tips and food coloring are over there on the table, I have stooped down to the level of using cans of icing. There's bowls in the cabinet to mix colors, and butter knives in the left drawer."

Patton picked up the bowl of dough and began scooping it out onto a new pan.

Virgil looked over to the table, where there was a mismash of laying on cooling racks and parchment paper. He smiled fondly and set to work dolling out white frosting into different bowls.

"What even is this?" He asked, holding up one oddly-shaped cookie.

"A candle! I used most of my cookie cutters, some of them are a little wacky."

"Should I just make a rainbow of colors and go from there?"

"If you can do it, go ahead. I give you full creative freedom, do whatever you'd like."

"Geez, Pat, too much pressure."

Patton just laughed. "It should be fun! Although, can you move the cookies off the racks when they're cool enough so I can use those for the other cookies?"

"Sure thing."

Virgil started with blue, dripping coloring into the frosting and stirring it with a toothpick. He settled for a bright blue, not too dark. It would be nice for snowflakes and decorating the snowpeople. Next was purple, mixing the blue with a little red. Cool colors were always easier to mix for some reason, and he ended with a pastel purple, almost lavender.

The green was darker, although scanning over the different cookie shapes, it would be perfect for the Christmas trees and wreaths.

The yellow was bright, for candle flames and stars. The red was dark, for Santa hats and candy canes. Then he mixed some red, blue, and green coloring together in careful parts to make black for the penguins. At the last moment, he remembered to reserve some white for the snowflakes and base of candy canes.

"Don't use too much black," Patton chuckled when he peeked over to see the colors Virgil had stirred up.

"I know, I know. They've got to be nice and colorful, like your everyday wardrobe."

"Hey, I've got to keep the kiddos entertained somehow!"

"You make them sound like they're kindergarteners, Pat. I doubt your graduate students are going to care about the color of your sweater."

"I'll have you know, one of my students complimented my pride shirt the other day. It was the bi-light of my day."

"Oh brother." Virgil groaned, but he was grinning.

"Shoo, go work your artist-y magic of making them look all pretty!"

"Aye aye, captain."

Patton returned to the fridge, taking out a copious amount of butter, and Virgil was once more amazed at his sheer kindness. Virgil certainly wouldn't have taken the time or money to get all these ingredients to make a hundred freaking cookies.

But he had just been recruited to be a decorator here. So decorate he would.

He picked up a blank Santa head with a hat and scooped some white into a piping bag before beginning to pipe a fluffy beard, adding a small pompom onto the tip of the hat.

Next was red for the suit and hat, piped in neat lines and smoothed with the blunt side of a butter knife.

Two tiny dots for the eyes and one cookie was done. Forty-nine to go.

Next was a snowflake, so Virgil pulled careful lines from the center outward, then running a thin line of blue down the center of each.

The yellow for a candle wasn't coming out of the piping bag very well, and when he could get it to run smoothly, it went outside of the lines he was trying to make. It looked like the flame was dripping down the candlestick.

He glanced over at Patton, who was determinedly pouring oats into the mixing bowl. He was not going to mess this up for his friend, who asked one job of him.

He got a fourth and fifth cookie done, and Patton pulled out the first batch of cookies.

Virgil wasn't getting through these fast enough. He had forty-five cookies to pipe, and he was being a perfectionist about them, and he knew he didn't have to, but these were important to Patton, and he really didn't wanna mess it up-

"Hey, kiddo? Are you alright?"

Virgil realized with a start that he was just standing there, staring at the cookies as if they had personally him issued a riddle.

"Yeah, I just-"

Patton was at his side, and Virgil almost sighed. Pat knew him too well, and could spot his mind spiraling a mile away.

"Spill. Cookies are therapeutic." Patton handed him a chocolate chip, and Virgil gratefully popped it into his mouth.

"This is just so important to you! If the cookies look bad, they'll reflect back on you, and people will think that you're bad as an extension, and you're just not! You're amazing, and I could never do what you're doing right now because you are such a good person. They have to be perfect."

Patton laughed, just a little, and Virgil raised an eyebrow.

"Kiddo, these cookies are going to our youth group carolers, and most of them have never touched a piping bag in their life. They're just going to see cookies and try to stuff as many of them as they can in their mouths. None of them are going to judge you or me, and my pastor will just be grateful there are any cookies at all. I appreciate that you care about me, but this is low-stakes."

Virgil took a deep breath. "Yeah, yeah, you're right. Sorry."

Patton shook his head. "No, it's sweet that you care so much. I don't know who else would help me with this."

"Right. Okay, back to work!" Virgil offered a crooked grin, and Patton beamed back.

They finished the rest of the cookies in about four hours. Virgil offered to do the dishes while Patton pulled a frankly worrying amount of Tupperware out from various cabinets where they were hidden.

"How many of those things do you have?" Virgil finally asked as Patton pulled out the fifth consecutive square container.

"Don't worry about it."

The first four were layered with the chocolate chip and oatmeal raisin cookies, and another three were carefully lined with parchment paper in layers to accommodate the dried sugar cookies.

Patton looked at the stack on his kitchen table and laughed. "I can't believe I really just did that."

"You're a crazy bastard sometimes."

"Hey!"

"I kid."

"Yes, you're such a kid."

"Take that back, you ancient elder who's basically crumbling to dust!"

"Never. Wow, kids these days."

"I am six months younger than you."

"And I still love you."

Virgil ruffled Patton's hair, and he ducked, laughing, to get away.

"Okay, let's go, I'll help you carry these to your car."

"Thank you."

So they carried the containers and containers to Patton's car, and when Patton asked if he wanted to come with him to take them to the church, Virgil readily agreed.

It was Saturday afternoon, at almost five o'clock, so Patton had to walk across the street to the parsonage to ask for the key to get in.

The pastor, an older woman named Dominique, insisted she let them in herself. Virgil almost visibly cringed getting out of the car, noticing his black skinny jeans dusted with flour and dyed hair and earring in one ear.

Patton had invited him over to his church plenty of times, but Virgil had gone through quite enough judgy church ladies when his mom had insisted he go to service and youth group a few years in middle school.

But Dominique didn't even seem to mind, chattering away to Patton about how grateful she was that he had taken this responsibility and how God had blessed him.

"And you as well!" She said, smiling brightly at Virgil. He awkwardly smiled back, trying not to drop the containers he had probably stacked too high.

When they had placed all the containers on the kitchen counters and Patton had gone through another obligatory five minutes of chatting with Dominique, the two got back in the car.

"Thank you again, I never could have done this without you," Patton said with a sigh.

"It's seriously no problem, Pat. What else would I have been doing tonight? Heating myself up a can of soup and watching baking show reruns?"

Patton raised a critical eyebrow. "Were you really just going to have one can of soup for dinner?"

"Uh, maybe."

"Unacceptable. You're staying and eating with me."

"What? You don't have to, I-"

"I want to," Patton said firmly. "I don't want to eat by myself tonight, you're eating with me."

"Fine. I'll pay, what are you thinking? Cracker Barrel?"

"Tch, Virgil, you sweet summer child. We are cooking together, and it is going to be an experience."

"Yes, Patton."

So that was how they ended the night once again at Patton's counter, breading and frying chicken for dinner. It was a pretty good day.


End file.
